1. Field of the Invention
The present disclosure generally relates to water amusement attractions and rides. More particularly, the disclosure generally relates to jet and side control gates for controlling water flow in water amusement rides.
2. Description of the Relevant Art
The 80's decade witnessed phenomenal growth in the participatory family water recreation facility (i.e., the water park) and in water oriented ride attractions in the traditional themed amusement parks. The main current genre of water ride attractions (e.g., waterslides, river rapid rides, and log flumes, and others) require participants to walk or be mechanically lifted to a high point, wherein, gravity enables water, rider(s), and riding vehicle (if appropriate) to slide down a chute or incline to a lower elevation splash pool, whereafter the cycle repeats. Some rides can move riders uphill and downhill but for efficiency and performance reasons these rides also generally start on an elevated tower and generally require walking up steps to reach the start of the ride.
With this phenomenal growth came the subsequent problem of finding enough appropriate land available for development into water recreation facilities. One of the problems facing water park developers is finding enough land upon which to develop their water parks. The development of water parks is an expensive enterprise to which the addition of having to purchase large tracts of land only further adds to the expense of developing water parks.
Generally speaking, the traditional downhill water rides are short in duration (normally measured in seconds of ride time) and have limited throughput capacity. The combination of these two factors quickly leads to a situation in which patrons of the parks typically have long queue line waits of up to two or three hours for a ride that, although exciting, lasts only a few seconds. Additional problems like hot and sunny weather, wet patrons, and other difficulties combine to create a very poor overall customer feeling of satisfaction or perceived entertainment value in the water park experience. Poor entertainment value in water parks as well as other amusement parks is rated as the biggest problem of the water park industry and is substantially contributing to the failure of many water parks and threatens the entire industry.
Additionally, none of the typical downhill water park rides is specifically designed to transport guests between rides. In large amusement parks, transportation between rides or areas of the park may be provided by a train or monorail system, or guests are left to walk from ride to ride or area to area. Trains or monorails have relatively minor entertainment value and are passive in nature in that they have little if any active guest-controlled functions such as choice of pathway, speed of riders or rider activity besides sightseeing from the vehicle. They are also generally unsuitable for water parks because of their high installation and operating costs and have poor ambience within the parks. These types of transportation are also unsuitable for water park guests who, because of the large amount of time spent in the water, are often wet and want to be more active because of the combination of high ambient temperatures in summertime parks and the normal heat loss due to water immersion and evaporative cooling. Water helps cool guests and encourages a higher level of physical activity. Guests also want to stay in the water for fun. Water parks are designed around the original experience of a swimming hole combined with the river rafting or tubing. The preferred feeling is one of natural ambience and organic experience. A good river ride combines calm areas and excitement areas like rapids, whirlpools, and beaches. Mechanical transportation systems do not fit in well with these types of rides. There exists a need in water parks for a means of transportation through the park and between the rides.
For water rides that involve the use of a floatation device (e.g., an inner tube or floating board) the walk back to the start of a ride may be particularly arduous since the rider must usually carry the floatation device from the exit of the ride back to the start of the ride. Floatation devices could be transported from the exit to the entrance of the ride using mechanical transportation devices, but these devices are expensive to purchase and operate. Carrying the floatation device or using mechanical transportation to transport the floatation device may reduce guest enjoyment, cause excess wear and tear on the floatation devices, contribute to guest injuries, and/or make it impossible for some guests to access the rides. Also, a park that includes many different non-integrated rides may require guests to use different floatation devices for different rides, which makes it difficult for the park operators to provide the guests with a general purpose floatation device. It is advantageous to standardize riding vehicles for rides as much as possible.
Typically water parks are quite large in size. Typically guests must enter at one area and pass through a changing room area upon entering the park. Rides and picnic areas located in areas distant to the entry area are often underused in relation to rides and areas located near the entry area. More popular rides are overly filled with guests waiting in queue lines for entry. This leads to conditions of overcrowding in areas of the park which leads to guest dissatisfaction and general reduction of optimal guest dispersal throughout the park. The lack of an efficient transportation system between rides accentuates this problem in water parks.
For the reasons stated above and more, a natural and exciting water transportation system to transport participants between rides as well as between parks may be used to interconnect many diverse and stand-alone water park rides. The transportation system relieves the riders from the burden of carrying their floatation devices up to the start of a water ride. The transportation system also allows the riders to stay in the water, thus keeping the riders cool while they are transported to the start of the ride. The transportation system also may be used to transport guests from one end of a water park to the other, between rides and past rides and areas of high guest density, between water parks, or between guest facilities such as hotels, restaurants, and shopping centers. The transportation system itself may be a main attraction with exciting water and situational effects while seamlessly incorporating into itself other specialized or traditional water rides and events.
A transportation system may use sloped and/or flat water channels to transport participants. The depth and/or flow of water in these water channels may be controlled by narrowing or widening the water channels. Narrowing or widening the water channels may especially be useful in deeper water channels typically used for water amusement rides. Typically, a fast moving water section (e.g., a downhill or downhill rapids section) is located following a slow moving water section (e.g., a flat water section). The slow moving water section is typically an area used to collect and/or organize participants before they move into the fast moving water section. The fast moving water section may have a narrower cross-section so that water flows through the fast moving water section at a higher velocity.
It is important to control the water depth in the slow moving water section for several reasons. One reason is that the velocity (flow rate) and momentum of water entering the fast moving water section from the slow moving water section is dependent upon the head (depth) of water at the beginning of the fast moving water section. The depth of water at the beginning of the fast moving water section is dependent upon the depth of water in the slow moving water section.
A second reason is that the velocity of riders in the slow moving water section and upstream of the fast moving water section is determined by the width, depth, and water flow of the slow moving water section of the water channel. Typically, the width and water flow are assumed to be constant, so the velocity of the riders is mainly determined by the water depth in the slow moving water section. The water depth in the slow moving water section may be maintained at a desired level (e.g., a relatively constant level) by selectively restricting the flow of water out of the slow moving water section. A restriction in the flow of water out of the slow moving water section increases the head in the slow moving water section. This increase in head may be balanced by an increase in velocity of the water flowing past the restriction so that the water depth in the slow moving water section is maintained at the desired level. Thus, the velocity of riders in the slow moving water section may be controlled by selecting the water depth in the slow moving water section using the restriction. Selective adjustment of the restriction may be used to adjust water depth in the slow moving water section and control the velocity of riders in the slow moving water section.
Some examples of devices that are used to restrict water flow through an open channel include a sluice gate or an adjustable submerged obstruction (e.g., an adjustable weir). Sluice gates are typically unsuitable for use in water parks in which people participate due to safety reasons. Adjustable submerged obstructions are generally expensive and difficult to install in a water park and/or are unsuitable for controlling the flow of water in a water park. Adjustable side gates may be used to restrict water flow through an open channel. Adjustable side gates include moving parts that open and close into a water channel. The adjustable side gates may be manually controlled and/or actuated by mechanical means. These moving parts may be unsuitable for water parks because of safety issues involving riders in the water channel, especially for the high volume flows of water seen in water parks.